List of United States immigration laws

A number of major laws and court decisions relating to immigration procedures and enforcement have been enacted in the United States.

Year	Name of Legislation/Case	Major Highlights
1790	Naturalization Act of 1790	Established the rules for naturalized citizenship, as per Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution, but placed no restrictions on immigration. Citizenship was limited to white persons, with no other restriction on non-whites.
1795	Naturalization Act of 1795	Lengthened required residency to become citizen.
1798	Naturalization Act (officially An Act to Establish a Uniform Rule of Naturalization; ch. 54, 1 Stat. 566) Alien Friends Act (officially An Act Concerning Aliens; ch. 58, 1 Stat. 570) Alien Enemies Act (officially An Act Respecting Alien Enemies; ch. 66, 1 Stat. 577)	Extended the duration of residence required for immigrants to become citizens to 14 years. Enacted June 18, 1798, with no expiration date, it was repealed in 1802. Authorized the president to deport any resident immigrant considered "dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States." It was activated June 25, 1798, with a two-year expiration date. Authorized the president to apprehend and deport resident aliens if their home countries were at war with the United States of America. Enacted July 6, 1798, and providing no sunset provision, the act remains intact today as 50 U.S.C. § 21
1870	Naturalization Act of 1870	Extended the naturalization process to "aliens of African nativity and to persons of African descent." Other non-whites were not included in this act and remained excluded from naturalization, per theNaturalization Act of 1790
1875	Page Act of 1875 (Sect. 141, 18 Stat. 477, 1873-March 1875)	The first federal immigration law and prohibited the entry of immigrants considered as "undesirable" The law classified as "undesirable" any individual from Asia who was coming to America to be a contract laborer strengthen the ban against "coolie" laborers, by imposing a fine of up to $2,000 and maximum jail sentence of one year upon anyone who tried to bring a person from China, Japan, or any oriental country to the United States "without their free and voluntary consent, for the purpose of holding them to a term of service" Imposed a 50 cent head tax to fund immigration officials.
1882	Chinese Exclusion Act	Restricted immigration of Chinese laborers for 10 years. Prohibited Chinese naturalization. Provided deportation procedures for illegal Chinese. Marked the birth of illegal immigration (in America). The Act was "a response to racism [in America] and to anxiety about threats from cheap labor [from China]."
1885	Alien Contract Labor Law (Sess. II Chap. 164; 23 Stat. 332)	Prohibited the importation and migration of foreigners and aliens under contract or agreement to perform labor in the United States
1891	Immigration Act	First comprehensive immigration laws for the US. Bureau of Immigration set up in the Treasury Dept. Immigration Bureau directed to deport unlawful aliens. Empowered "the superintendent of immigration to enforce immigration laws".
1892	Geary Act	Extended and strengthened the Chinese Exclusion Act.
1898	United States v. Wong Kim Ark	The Supreme Court ruled that a child of Chinese descent born in the United States - whose parents at the time of his birth are subjects of the Emperor of China but who are domiciled in the United States as permanent residents; are carrying on business there; and are not employed in any diplomatic or other official capacity under the Emperor of China - is a citizen of the United States by virtue of having been born "in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof," per the first clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Several years later, in the wake of the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fire, a number of Chinese immigrants who were otherwise subject to the Chinese Exclusion Act were nonetheless able to claim American citizenship by alleging they were born in San Francisco, and that their birth certificates had been destroyed along with those of everyone else who had been born in San Francisco. "Papers for fictitious children were sold in China, allowing Chinese to immigrate despite the laws."
1903	Immigration Act of 1903 (Anarchist Exclusion Act)	Added four inadmissible classes: anarchists, people with epilepsy, beggars, and importers of prostitutes
1906	Naturalization Act of 1906	Standardized naturalization procedures made some knowledge of English a requirement for citizenship established the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization
1907	Immigration Act of 1907	Restricted immigration for certain classes of disabled and diseased people
1917	Immigration Act of 1917 (Barred Zone Act)	Restricted immigration from Asia by creating an "Asiatic Barred Zone" and introduced a reading test for all immigrants over fourteen years of age, with certain exceptions for children, wives, and elderly family members.
1918	Immigration Act of 1918	Expanded on the provisions of the Anarchist Exclusion Act.
1921	Emergency Quota Act	Limited the number of immigrants from any country to 3% of those already in the US from that country as per the 1910 census. "An unintended consequence of the 1920s legislation was an increase in illegal immigration. Many Europeans who did not fall under the quotas migrated to Canada or Mexico, which [as Western Hemisphere nations] were not subject to national-origin quotas; [and] subsequently they slipped into the United States illegally."
1922	The Cable Act of 1922 (ch. 411, 42 Stat. 1021, "Married Women’s Independent Nationality Act")	Reversed former immigration laws regarding marriage, also known as the Married Women's Citizenship Act or the Women's Citizenship Act. Previously, a woman lost her US citizenship if she married a foreign man, since she assumed the citizenship of her husband, a law that did not apply to men who married foreign women. The law repealed sections 3 and 4 of the Expatriation Act of 1907.
1924	Immigration Act(Johnson Act)	Imposed first permanent numerical limit on immigration. Began a national-origin quota system.
1924	National Origins Formula	Established with the Immigration Act of 1924. Total annual immigration was capped at 150,000. Immigrants fit into two categories: those from quota-nations and those from non-quota nations. Immigrant visas from quota-nations were restricted to the same ratio of residents from the country of origin out of 150,000 as the ratio of foreign-born nationals in the United States. The percentage out of 150,000 was the relative number of visas a particular nation received. Non-quota nations, notably those contiguous to the United States only had to prove an immigrant's residence in that country of origin for at least two years prior to emigration to the United States. Laborers from Asiatic nations were excluded but exceptions existed for professionals, clergy, and students to obtain visas.
1930s		Federal officials deported "Tens of thousands, and possibly more than 400,000, Mexicans and Mexican-Americans... Many, mostly children, were U.S. citizens." "Applications for legal admission into the United States increased following World War II — and so did illegal immigration." Some used fraudulent marriages as their method of illegal entry in the U.S. "Japanese immigration became disproportionately female, as more women left Japan as "picture brides", betrothed to emigrant men into the U.S. whom they had never met."
1940	Nationality Act of 1940	Pertains chiefly to "Nationality at Birth," Nationality through Naturalization," and "Loss of Nationality"
1943	Chinese Exclusion Repeal Act of 1943 (Magnuson Act)	Repealed the Chinese Exclusion Act and permitted Chinese nationals already in the country to become naturalized citizens.
1952	Immigration and Nationality Act (McCarran-Walter Act)	Set a quota for aliens with skills needed in the US. Increased the power of the government to deport illegal immigrants suspected ofCommunist sympathies.
1953	Kwong Hai Chew v. Colding Template:344 U.S. 590, 596	The Supreme Court found, "The Bill of Rights is a futile authority for the alien seeking admission for the first time to these shores. But once an alien lawfully enters and resides in this country he becomes invested with the rights guaranteed by the Constitution to all people within our borders".
1954		A wave of illegal immigration came from Mexico in the early 1950s, but it was dampened by President Eisenhower.
1965	INA Amendments (Hart-Celler Act)	Repealed the national-origin quotas. Initiated a visa system for family reunification and skills. Set a quota for Western Hemisphere immigration. Set a 20k country limit for Eastern Hemisphere aliens.
1966	Cuban Refugee Adjustment Act	Cuban nationals who enter, or were already present in the United States, legal status.
1970s		The United States saw a total number of illegal immigrants estimated at 1.1 million, or half of one percent of the United States population.
1980s		About 1.3 million illegal immigrants entered the US.
1982	Plyler v. Doe, 457 U.S. 202 (1982)	The Supreme Court of the United States struck down a state statute denying funding for education to children who were illegal immigrants. It established that a state must show that substantial state interests are furthered before that state can deny a discrete group of children the free public education that it offers to other children within its borders. The court also stated that illegal immigrants are "within the jurisdiction" of the states in which they reside and, therefore, receive 14th amendment protections and stated, "We have never suggested that the class of persons who might avail themselves of the equal protection guarantee is less than coextensive with that entitled to due process. To the contrary, we have recognized [457 U.S. 202, 212] that both provisions were fashioned to protect an identical class of persons, and to reach every exercise of state authority."
1986	Immigration Reform and Control Act	Started sanctions for knowingly hiring illegal aliens. Provided amnesty to illegal aliens already in the US. Increased border enforcement. Made it a crime to hire an illegal immigrant
1990s		Over 5.8 million illegal immigrants entered the US in the 1990s. Mexico rose to the head of the list of sending countries, followed by the Philippines, Vietnam, the Dominican Republic, and China.
1990	Immigration Act	Increased legal immigration ceilings. Created a diversity admissions category. Tripled the number of visas for priority workers and professionals with U.S. job offers
1990	United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez	the court reiterated the finding of Kwong Hai Chew v. Colding, 344 U.S. 590, 596 (1953), "The Bill of Rights is a futile authority for the alien seeking admission for the first time to these shores. But once an alien lawfully enters and resides in this country he becomes invested with the rights guaranteed by the Constitution to all people within our borders". Stated, "those cases in which aliens have been determined to enjoy certain constitutional rights establish only that aliens receive such protections when they have come within the territory of, and have developed substantial connections with, this country. See, e. g., Plyler v. Doe, 457 U.S. 202, 212 ."
1996	Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (IIRaIRA)	Phone verification for worker authentication by employers. Access to welfare benefits more difficult for legal aliens. Increased border enforcement. Reed Amendment attempted to deny visas to former U.S. citizens, but was never enforced
1999	Rodriguez v. United States, 169 F.3d 1342, (11th Cir. 1999)	Held that statutes which discriminate within the class of aliens comport with the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment (and the equal protection principles it incorporates) so long as they satisfy rational basis scrutiny.
Post 9/11/2001		An estimated 3.1 million immigrants entered the United States illegally between 2000 and 2005. From 1998 to 2001, Mexicans accounted for 68% of immigrants who entered the United States illegally. That percentage jumped to 78% for the years between 2001 and 2005, mostly due to stricter security measures that followed the September 11, 2001 Attacks upon the United States (which more efficiently prevented illegal entry from nations that did not share a land or maritime boundary with the United States).
2002	Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act	Provided for more Border Patrol agents. Requires that schools report foreign students attending classes. Stipulates that foreign nationals in the US will be required to carry IDs with biometric technology.
2005	REAL ID Act	Required use of IDs meeting certain security standards to enter government buildings, board planes, open bank accounts. Created more restrictions on political asylum Severely curtailed habeas corpus relief for immigrants Increased immigration enforcement mechanisms Altered judicial review Established national standards for state driver licenses. Cleared the way for the building of border barriers.

See also

• Illegal immigration to the United States
• Immigration to the United States

Further reading

• Different Types of Immigration Visas in the United States of America
• Lemay, Michael and Elliott Robert Barkan, eds. U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Laws and Issues: A Documentary History, Greenwood Press, 1999. ISBN 0-313-30156-5
• U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Historical Immigration and Naturalization Legislation
• Zolberg, Aristide. A Nation by Design: Immigration Policy in the Fashioning of America, Harvard University Press, 2006. ISBN 0-674-02218-1